Pages

Thursday, September 18, 2014

Sponsor Spotlight No.2 - Tando Creative

Servus! Claudia here bringing to you another spotlight inspiration showcasing another of the products of this month's challenge sponsor

If you haven't already seen Julia's fantastic project, I highly recommend you scroll down (or simply click the link) to find out what she made of Tando's advent calender (who would have guessed it was so versatile?).

I chose Tando Creative's "3 Clocks in 1" for my spotlight creation:

and altered a 3 Euro clock from one of those 1 Euro shops to make it look like this:

I had a massive play with a lot of the new DecoArt media stuff (you'll find a list of all the materials I used at the bottom of this post) and accidentally "invented" a cool technique to create a kind of "splintered enamel" effect.

But lets start with how my clock looked "before":

it looked quite "nice", but was too small, so I was very happy to find that the largest of Tando's "3 Clocks in 1" fit perfectly as a kind of outer frame. I only had to build some framework to attach the clock face. So I used some small pieces of wood (left from a very small canvas) and glued six of these to the back of my small clock - using DecoArt matte Decou-Page.

Then I covered my clock and the Tando piece with a layer of DecoArt's black Gesso from the new media line (don't worry if there are any brushstrokes visible - these will be covered later).

Once this had dried, I gave it all a coat of DecoArt media "Matte Medium" to seal my surface for further treatment.

The Matte Medium spreads really easily and goes a long way! It is also fast drying, so I didn't have to wait or speed up the process with the heat tool (which I wouldn't recommend anyway as this can cause nasty bubbles when acrylic colours or medium are getting too hot).

Then I got out the new DecoArt media white Crackle Paint and started painting only a small area of my clock at one time - as the crackle paint dries rather quickly, painting the whole clock would leave you with dried paint - which will prevent my technique from working!

So here's what you have to do:

- paint a rather small area with white crackle paint

- take a fine tip brush and load it with your washes (one at a time) and sprinkle these onto the still wet crackle paint

- vary the size of the sprinkles to get large puddles of wet paint as well as smaller stains that will dry quicker

- leave the large puddles of watery paint as they are and repeat all the steps until you have covered the whole clock

Allow your sprinkled on colours to mix and create random colour effects. Don't dab any of the large puddles dry until the crackle paint has done its magic!!!!!

Once the crackle paint has dried completely, take a piece of kitchen roll and dab off the wet paint from the larger stains - this will remove the diluted acrylic colours AND the crackle paint and reveal the black colour from underneath!

This way you get the look of a splintered enamel surface:

You can also see how the black Gesso underneath the white crackle paint makes the cracks more visible!

As it is only a few days past mid-month, I would like to remind you of my actual "Autumnal Image Inspiration" challenge over here at Our Creative Corner, which is still open until the 28th of the month! I would be sooo happy to see you join in!!!

WOW! I'm in crackle heaven with this stunning clock Claudia. Love your take on the technique too so will have to try it with the crackle paint. The black gesso underneath gives a stunning effect with your crackle and soft colours. LOVE LOVE LOVE!!Thanks for mentioning my house project too mwah!Julia xx

Oh wow! Thank you for making this, and sharing it, writing the blogpost, the step by step guide and named the materials and also said what not to do!One of our glass clocks fell down a while ago. The glass broke ofcourse but the mechanics are still fine, so I wanted to make my own clockface, a steampunk style one. I only got as far as cutting out a circle (and then deciding it was too small / not firm enough). I'm not sure I still want to go steampunk now! The supplies I have are similar, though different brands or different colours. Hmm it probably doesn't get the same effect with white gesso and copper crackle paint. Well, at least it sounds like a fun technique to try out, not just on clocks!Debbie / Daqa.

Wow!!! Fabulous project, I LOVE your clock Claudia!!! Wonderful idea to combine a cheap clock to Tando's ones, and your final piece is stunning and truly magical!! Thank you for the great step-by-step! Coco x